1. Field
The present application relates to a device for measuring activity of cultured cells, and to peripheral technologies thereof.
2. Description of the Related Art
Technologies for measuring biological activity of cultured cells are fundamental technologies in broad fields including state-of-the-art medical field such as regenerative medicine, screening of pharmaceutical products, and the like. For example, there exists processes to multiply and differentiate cells in vitro in the field of regenerative medicine. In these processes, it is inevitable to measure biological activity of cultured cells in order to control success/failure of differentiation of cells, canceration of cells, and presence of infection.
On the other hand, among methods for measuring activity of cells which have been known publicly, there is measurement with a flow cell sorter as an example of a method for analyzing and then separating cells. In the flow cell sorter, cells after being subjected to fluorescence staining treatment are isolated in a droplet which is given an electric charge, and this droplet is dropped. Then, the direction of falling of the droplet is controlled by applying an electric field based on the presence of fluorescence in the cells in this droplet and the amount of scattering light, thereby allowing collection of the cells in a fractionating manner in plural containers (see, for example, Michael E. Kamarck, Methods in Enzymology, Vol. 151, pp. 150 to 165, (1987)).
Further, as a method for evaluating activity of a mass of cells, there are also known enzyme immunoassay (EIA) and fluoroimmunoassay (FIA), or ELISA combining both of them for performing high sensitivity analysis of substances in liquid.